Welcome to the Faculty of Communication Sciences

Welcome to our website! On behalf of the Faculty of Communication Sciences I would like to invite you all to visit the site for information about our mission, our staff and our various activities, and in particular for details about our teaching programmes and research projects. This is no more than you would expect, of course.

You will soon see, however, as you visit the site, that our Faculty stands out for one aspect of its approach: its multidisciplinary.

The Faculty brings together researchers and teachers from a diverse range of academic backgrounds – from semiologists to engineers and from economists to political theorists (not to mention my own field of jurisprudence). All of us share a common interest in the phenomenon of communication, which obviously carries considerable importance in today’s dynamic and global society with which we are all familiar. We approach it by bringing together pure and applied research, and teach it from a practical perspective.

Multidisciplinary is a complex approach. It demands a sense of listening, of agreement and of innovation: all the more so when a multidisciplinary approach is adopted in a multicultural and multilingual context. USI, indeed, is the most international of all the Swiss universities. And it is precisely this pluralism that makes our Faculty so attractive and so enriching.

You may also notice that we stand out for the close relationship we maintain between our staff and our students – something that is getting ever harder to find. Contacts are carefully nurtured at all levels and academic expertise is always readily available.

This makes it much easier for discussion – without which, of course, no knowledge can develop – to take place.

But not even the most sophisticated and well constructed website could demonstrate all of this. So do please come and see us in Lugano. We will all be delighted to welcome you and share our enthusiasm!

Bertil Cottier
Dean of the Faculty of Communication Sciences